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Chapter 17

  From Within

Part 4: Tricksely

She now had the proof she needed, evidence that would show her parents beyond any doubt just how wrong they were when that awful situation became reality. She hadn't believed them. Oh no, she knew better than that. She was way smarter than that. And, of outmost importance, she could now prove it. Having spent months and months collecting all her evidence, she now had the means to actually prove she would never be so stupid as to believe what they said. Of course, she knew she would never really fall for anything they could come up with, especially not anything as transparent as trying to fool her into showing any kind of affection, but they didn't know that, and so she also knew they could misinterpret her reactions as being feelings of affection. They would think they'd got the upper hand, and they would take full advantage of that, making fun of her and laughing at her with that awful mocking laughter in front of everyone. But now, now she knew that could never happen, because if it did, she could just bring forth her evidence and say: "No, look, I didn't believe you." Just that, in a calm, convincing tone confirming her statement.
          Her evidence made her feel as close to secure as she could hope for. She was prepared, she knew how to take control of things like that before they happened. At moments when she'd thought about all of this in terms of good and evil, to sort out in which category this behaviour of hers fell, she'd reckoned this was beyond good and evil. This was, well, just necessary, a necessary part of facing reality. She had to be prepared, she had to be able to protect herself. She had no one but herself to turn to now when her friend was no longer with her. This was the only way.
          She had thought about other potentially threatening scenarios too, thought about how to deal with them, should they happen, and she felt convinced she was kind of prepared for most things by now, her evidence covered a lot of threats. No she wasn't gonna let anyone outsmart her. Not again. Not like those times before when she had said, or repeated really, things her father had told her, and they'd laughed at her, as if she was saying something funny. She hadn't understood what was so funny, but she'd sensed it wasn't a nice laughter, and she'd thought maybe there was something funny about what she'd said that she didn't understand. Later on she'd found out she'd been lied to: she had been repeating a lie, believing it was the truth she'd spoken.
          This had made her think a lot about the world. What was true and what wasn't? Who could be trusted, and who couldn't? And she came to the conclusion that she couldn't trust anyone. They were cold and tricksely all of them. Also her peers, they weren't nice or trustworthy either, the kids on the street loved to pick on one another, at any sign of weakness they jumped on the opportunity and were ever so cleaver in coming up with names. Yes, the little girl had put all her mind into making sense out of it all, she'd spent lots and lots of time trying to figure out what was, and what wasn't, carefully and meticulously she'd weighed different alternatives against each other, and now she knew how it was and what to do.
          She knew she had to be very strong to make it, oh yes she knew that. No matter how much it hurt her to see the pain in her mothers' eyes when her mother tricksely tried to reach out to her, the little girl knew she had to look past it and respond to it with contempt. She could not give in, not one tiny bit. Because in her mind she knew her mother didn't really reach out to her, she was just trying to play her, trying to make her believe she was reaching out. She knew this for a fact, because before, when she was gullible, she had responded affectionately to her mom’s tricks. And then, when she did, her mom shifted shape instantly, and she'd said to the little girl that her mother had gone away, and when the girl said "but I can still see you, you are here!" the person who wasn't her mom anymore said with a monotonous voice: "I'm not your mother, I'm just a shell, your mother is somewhere else."
          And every time that'd happened the little girl felt a huge panic overtaking her, an unbearable, suffocating panic, and she'd cried and screamed and hit her mom in despair. This went on until her mother began laughing, saying "Did you believe that? How could you? You're such a fool!". And then the little girl felt deeply ashamed, and she hated her weakness and stupidity.
         In this and other ways deception was pierced into her soul, a shady betrayal she could sense ever so strongly but not make sense out of, or put into words. The only way she knew how to handle that pain and the confusion burn marks they left inside of her, was to pretend nothing could really affect her; to respond to everything by acting as if she didn't feel anything. And she'd gotten rather good at it when I met her, in the eyes of some at least, because she told me her parents used to say to her she was a cold, insensitive, deceitful and troublemaking person.
          Yeah, she could be trouble, like when her father got really angry with her brother and went after him in rage, hitting him, it awoke a fury inside of her. Her brother was so week and scared, she just couldn't bear seeing him afraid like that, getting beaten by their father. She knew just what to say and what to do to draw her father’s infuriated attention away from her brother and onto her. She yelled names at him and stared him in the eye, and immediately he stopped beating her brother and turned his black rage onto her. Oh that was horrendous. And afterwards her parents said there was something fundamentally wrong with her emotionally, making her father go mad on her like that. Yes, she already knew that, she knew she had evil inside of her, how could she not?, she was, after all, a troll child.
          She could take all of that now, she told me, she held her security within her box of evidence. In a voice I could hear being much more cocky then she really was she said: "When I was just a kid, you know, around three years old or so, it was so easy for me to fall for their lies. But back then my friend was with me, and she always told me how to run things, so it wasn't all that scary, you know, it never freaked me out or so, coz my friend knew everything, and also, she got me thinking happy thoughts in a heartbeat ... yeah ... she was like really funny!" But now, when her friend had been taken from her, leaving her all alone in this world, the little girl had promised herself she would never fall for it again. So now, when the threatening sound filled the air she met whatever it was with different shades of rage, and, with the patience of an angel she kept collecting items of outmost importance for her box of evidence. She had control. She wasn't gonna let anyone outsmart her. "And besides", she said, "my mommy isn't even human, she's a robot so she can't feel love, or pain, not really."

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As I listened to all she said my heart overflowed with sadness, grief and sorrow. I could see how she'd twisted and turned things around to make sense out of them and how, being a child, she had no way of understanding anything if it wasn't revolving around her; emanating from her. I could understand perfectly well why and how she'd come to the conclusions she had, oh yes, it didn't take a rocket scientist to figure that out. And I felt anger towards the adults in her world for not listening to her, seeing her, making some kind of effort to help her. How could they be so blind?, I wondered, even though in my soul I already knew the answer: They acted out of ignorance, that particular kind of ignorance which is induced by fear and confusion, wounds never healed – some of which was inflicted already when they themselves were new to this earth, and, illogical though it may seem, at times they also did what they did with the very best of intentions.
          And it suddenly hit me just how easy it was to gain the little girl's trust. It was almost paradoxical since her whole world was created around the belief that everyone would betray her. All you really had to do was to see her. But no one did. What is it that makes it so hard, so threatening, to hear people out, too see them, perhaps especially when it comes to children? I will never really understand it, not really; not in my heart. I mean, when you truly ponder upon it, isn't it much scarier what you risk doing by not listening, than anything, anything, that can come about if you open up your heart and simply listen?
          This little girl didn't want her conspiracy theory to be right, what she wanted more than anything was to be proven wrong.

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Everything she found wonderful, precious, tender, bright, loving, amazing, and happy within her she gave to me. She didn't even know this herself but she wanted me to be their vessel, trying this way to protect the very light in life from being tainted, distorted and warped by the people around her. So when they viciously ripped me away from her, blinded by their own inner fears, she felt as had she lost everything, everything that was good and playful and loving in life, and that stung my heart with a pain so intense it echoed throughout the whole of the Universe, a pain beyond what words can express – her pain, in losing it all. A gate of darkness and despair opened up and separated us, it sucked her into a world were nothing existed but a cold, desolate, suffocating greyness. And here she was trapped, the door to tender, loving light, to warmth and happiness, had closed on her.

Only it wasn't true, she couldn't vessel in me the light, beauty and wonders that is hers to shine, no, such a thing isn't even possible. And besides, the gate of darkness wasn't there for real, it was just an illusion because I never left, how could I? I will love her forever, but from that moment on and for many many years to come I was unable to reach through to her. But one day our spirits will entwine again, I know this for a fact, and I'm longing for that day to come with every single beat of my heart.

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